The Paul Meek Library is hosting a new exhibit, “Little Shadow Catcher – The Photography of D. F. Barry,” in the J. Houston Gordon Museum.
“Little Shadow Catcher” displays the photography David Frances Barry made directly from his glass plate negatives by Paul H. Harbaugh in conjunction with the Denver Public Library’s Western History department.
Barry worked with a traveling photographer, Orlando S. Goff, to photograph and record the Sioux War and Native Americans.
By 1881, Barry and Goff had the “best and most comprehensive collection of images of U.S. Army soldiers and Native American warriors.”
Throughout the exhibit, photos are displayed of American soldiers, with one photo featuring the 10-year reunion of survivors at the battlefield of the Battle of Little Bighorn. Barry was the only photographer invited to the event.
The exhibit also features photographs of many Native American men, particularly of the Lakota people. His most notable photograph is that of Sioux Chief Tatanka Iyotake, also known as Chief Sitting Bull. Barry became friends with the Lakota people and earned the nickname “Icastinyanka Cikala Hanzi,” which means “Little Shadow Catcher.”
Barry also photographed Annie Oakley, American sharpshooter and exhibitionist. Her photo is one of the three large canvas photos displayed in the exhibit.
The exhibit piqued the interest of Samuel Richardson, head of Special Collections and Archives at UTM.
“I was searching the internet for traveling exhibits and this one appeared. So, I put out an inquiry to the Museum of the Rockies and was able to get it for our museum,” Richardson said.
The library hosts traveling exhibits in the museum every semester. Most of the exhibits are on display for eight weeks. If the library does not pull in a traveling exhibit, they try to put on their own display.
The library tries to obtain exhibits that cover a wide variety of subjects. Richardson encourages students to come by and check out the exhibits periodically.
For those interested in the exhibit, it will be in the J. Houston Gordon Museum in the library until March 25, and the museum is open Monday-Friday from 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
